Have you ever had a future memory? Last night, while rushing around all nimbly-bimbly, getting things together for Doug’s wedding this weekend, I was stopped at a light, facing West, sun setting in my eyes and Bloc Party’s song ‘Like Eating Glass’ playing on the mobile unit. Now I wasn’t paying much attention to the song at first. No, I was daydreaming that, if I live another 40 years, I’ll truly deserve to be called an old man. I imagined how much the world might change given another 40 spins around the sun. Then the song invaded my headspace:

It’s so cold in this house
Open mouth swallowing us
The children staying home from school
Will not stop crying

And I know that you’re busy too
I know that you care
You got your finger on the pulse
You got your eyes everywhere
And it hurts all the time when you don’t return my calls
And you haven’t got the time to remember how it was
It’s so cold in this house
It’s so cold in this house

I can’t eat, I can’t sleep
I can’t sleep, I can’t dream
An aversion to light
Got a fear of the ocean

Like drinking poison, like eating glass

It’s so cold in this house
Come and show me how it was

We’ve got crosses on our eyes
Been walking into the walls again
We’ve got crosses on our eyes
Been walking into the furniture
We’ve got crosses on our eyes
For richer, for poorer, for better, for worse
We’ve got crosses on our eyes
We’ve been walking into the furniture

Now, the song seems to be about a couple who’ve grown apart and are kind of stuck in a stagnant pattern, unable to reconnect and unwilling to break it off (or vice versa)…but last night, thinking of the future, I imagined me or my wife singing this song to ourselves when the other is dead and gone. And it made me sad, as it always does, when I stop to reflect how the happy times seem to pass by so quickly…and the sad times seem to be temporally multiplied. And how, happy or sad, everything you love or hate will come and pass before you really know what to do with it.

Then I hopped on the highway, and flipped on the Buzz to hear Lazlo play Fugazi’s ‘Waiting Room’, which sent me into a memory of times past – of Pat, Court, and I driving up to Java Gaia on SW Boulevard (great coffee shop that got flooded in ’93), listening to 13 Songs, ordering Italian sodas, smoking clove cigarettes, talking, talking, talking. I was a socializing fool in those days, longing for conversation – phone calls, even – never an extrovert, not really, just willing to talk with and listen to anyone. And I’m listening to Fugazi, thinking of Patty today – married 3 years, child on the way – and thinking about how your friends, especially the long-term ones, pop in and out of your life. I sort of lost my connection with Pat when we all moved to Springfield in ’99. He got into competitive bike riding and I got really into my school work and, although we lived together, we didn’t see much of one another. And as the song was wrapping up, rhythm pounding out, my head bobbing, I’m remembering drinking coffee with Pat and his girlfriend at Java Gaia, the first non-diner coffee shop I’d ever been to, watching and listening to hipsters (Early 90s’ hipsters, people! Smashing Pumpkins’ Siamese Dream wasn’t even out yet! KLZR was a relevant radio station!), those hipsters in their Dinosaur Jr. and Mudhoney shirts, they smoke their smokes and talk about literature and art and politics, they toss I Ching yarrow stalks, they smoke and they smoke and they smoke…and I’m hoping Pat’s doing well. I hope his wife and unborn baby are too. And I’m hoping the next time Pat hears ‘Waiting Room’ it brings back smoky memories from long ago.

Do you know about Cliff Drive? The only urban scenic by-way in the country? Right here in Kansas City?

?

BB! is working with the Cliff Drive Corridor Management Committee to build a web presence for Cliff Drive/Kessler Park.
Check it out, tell us what you think.
Would those of you who live in Old NEKC please e-mail to thinman(at)baddaboom.org any info regarding NEKC Neighborhood Associations on the web? We’d like to provide outbound links to any websites those Associations may have.
You may also e-mail suggestions for other things you’d like to see on the site or items of interest we might add.

If you’ve never been to that part of KC – it’s bee-yoo-tee-full.

In other news,

My wife is a rock star. She stayed at out at Jes’s bachelorette party until past 5 in the morning. Bad ass.

Mad thanks to sirvinegar, for hooking me up last night with free passes to a pre-screening of Serenity. I only caught a few episodes of Firefly when it originally aired – and thankfully the film stands on it’s own whether or not you’re familiar with the series. (You could tell there were some serious fanboys and girls in the crowd, however, as the appearance of certain characters garnered applause from the audience.)
The film itself is entertaining space opera sci-fi…not too cerebral but not too hokey either – simply well-balanced and fun. What’s more interesting to me, however, about this film is how it all came about. From Serenity’s website:

The film is based on Whedonâ€™s critically acclaimed, short-lived television series Firefly, which aired on the FOX TV Network during the fall of 2002. Set in a futuristic, post-Earth universe dominated by a planetary Alliance, the series chronicled the adventures of the ragtag spaceship Serenity and her eclectic crew of outcasts, led by Captain Malcolm â€œMalâ€? Reynolds, played by NATHAN FILLION. Although FOX TV cancelled the show after only 11 of the 14 produced episodes had aired, Fireflyâ€™s quirky mix of humor, complex characters and sci-fi had attracted a loyal and passionate following.The heartbroken fans, the cast and Whedon wouldnâ€™t allow the cancellation of the series to equal the end of this universe. For Whedon, â€œthis story was not done being told. It wasnâ€™t out of me yetâ€¦and it wasnâ€™t out of these actors.â€? While efforts to find a new home for the series on another network or cable channel proved fruitless, all parties were nonetheless determined to keep the campaign alive. Lobbying for the release of the series on DVD, they saw the Firefly fan base multiply dramatically after the episodes went on saleâ€”almost exactly one year after the last airing on FOX. Once on shelves, the sales of Firefly resoundingly expressed both the loyalty of the fans and the potential for creating new ones.

Still, as much as they refused to give up the good fight, everyone invested in the series knew it would take a miracle to see their beloved show resurrected…(A)n online campaign, coupled with strong DVD sales and support from critics, provided just the ammunition Whedon needed to bring his vision to the masses. Browncoats identified with the daily struggles of the Firefly crewâ€”misfits who refused to be assimilated into an Alliance-ruled universe. Online portals for fans of the show were deluged with cries to bring Firefly back. Hopeful fan mail reached studio executives. Advertisements were taken out in Variety to keep the show alive. Browncoats who had found a home on this battered cargo ship were showing their collective muscle…The rebirth came when Whedon and producer BARRY MENDEL (The Sixth Sense, The Royal Tenenbaums) took the idea for a feature film to Mary Parent, who at the time was vice chairman of worldwide production for Universal Pictures. â€œA lot of people have asked how hard it was to convince the studio to do this, and itâ€™s weirdâ€¦it wasnâ€™t that way at all,â€? explains Mendel. â€œMary was a fan of Joss and kept in touch with him and with me. And to Universalâ€™s credit, they understood that Joss had a passion to do this.â€? The studio believed in both Whedonâ€™s vision and this story and purchased the rights to make a major motion picture out of his unique television series.

Anyway, I know that’s a lot of back story for a film that isn’t mind-boggling good, but it’s an interesting look at the power geeks (and their collective wallets/purses) hold. Now if only Carnivale geeks could band together…

So I find out this morning that the Superficial Plaza Chick has invited me to be roasted.
One wonders if this is the tactic she employs for dating, “Hey, I see you’re minding your own business…care to let me make your life miserable for a bit?” With this approach, is it any surprise she’s hooked up with winners such as these:

One thing you might notice about SPC is that she doesn’t post photos of herself and her readers often bemoan this fact. Some people think this lack of photographic representation means that SPC is ugly or really a guy. I doubt it. The folks who post tons of photos of themselves on-line are rarely that fine (take a look around this site if you think otherwise). Plus, why advertise with a photo? When you get around like she does, and write about it later, the way you look doesn’t even factor. SPC could be a transsexual, Nazi Eskimo…but she puts out. That’s all you need to know.

Now I began reading SPC’s blog way back when she first started and the first thing I thought was, “This lady knows what pleases women.” And, after almost a year of reading her, I still think that. She knows women so well that she’d probably be a lot happier if she started dating them. Well, maybe she wouldn’t be happier, but her blog might not be so repetitive. Is there a more formulaic blog in our city?

Only recently, with her roast of Life of a Single Woman, can SPC finally claim the Dynastic dynamism (some might say “terrific trampism”) of Joan Collins. Actually, her blog is more reminiscent of Melrose Place, only the writing is worse, the plot more see-through and there’s no eye candy to distract the audience.

Speaking of bad writing, have you read any of SPC’s haiku? Her haiku are so bad they make greeting card drivel seem like Modernist masterpieces. A local student tried to pass off one of SPC’s haiku as her own and not only did school officials put her on anti-depressants, they sent the poor kid home on the short bus. Hell, everytime one of these is read, the Japanese government considers redefining the form. Here’s a haiku for you, SPC:

Before You Write Poetry
If you cannot spell
“considerate“, “consider
it” all off limits.

All in all, SPC’s blog is truly representative of Kansas City, spread out wide and willing to bend over for any possibility of future development.

DIDN’T YOU KNOW? Superficial Plaza Chick keeps the Chachs of KC in check – and writes about it with no-holds-barred wit and sarcasm. BB! reads her..and so should you.

Comments

Sweet. Jesus. Why waste the space? I won’t bore you with my feelings on her, but I always enjoy catfights.

Onto more important matters: we inherited a Dyson from my parents and it’s the shit. Seriously. The most fun I’ve ever had while cleaning. And I love to clean.

i know those dyson’s are nice…but with roomba – you don’t even have to be there!!!
i can vacuum all day every day without ever having to vacuum.
i can vacuum while i take a shower
i can vacuum while i work out
i can vacuum while i sleep (if i don’t mind a little noise)
O ROOMBA! my Roomba! our cleaning trip is just begun

“Love? Maybe itâ€™s because these beautiful creatures have the shape of middle Americans, waddle amusingly, fall over occasionally and have heads on top of their bodies that we project our needs and anxieties onto them. But we do so at our peril. Love, it turns out, has very little to do with the mating habits of the emperor penguin.”